Frosted Glass
by AshenMoon42
Summary: Dead. The word seems unreal - it doesn't connect in my mind to the names that accompany it. Dead. The word burns a hole through my heart. / Remus is the last Marauder, and he doesn't know how to carry on.


**This one's sad. :'(**

 **Tell me how I did!**

 **Frosted Glass**

Dead. The word leaps out of the paper, which is stuck to the side of a building. Dead.

Dead: no longer alive. Deceased, departed, gone.

Dead. A word that doesn't connect with the words that accompany it.

It is a word I am familiar with. It seems to run through the pages of the Daily Prophet these days, weaved between other words which are just as depressing.

Dead. A word that burns a hole through my heart.

Sometimes they say you don't process it when it happens to someone close to you. They say it takes a while for it to hit you.

It was like that with my mother.

Now, though…

My brain becomes numb. I can't move, I can hardly breathe. The noise of my surroundings fade out of existence. The traffic, the voices, the general bustle that I haven't seen for months disappears entirely, and my vision becomes a blur of colour.

 _Lily and James Potter were found dead in their home on the morning of November 1st._

Dead.

No, not Lily and James. Not them. What of Harry? Sirius is probably a wreck.

 _The couple are believed to have been betrayed by Death Eater Sirius Black, he-who-must-not-be-named's right hand man. They were killed by the Dark Lord himself._

The whole war seems irrelevant. The hiding, all that work. It doesn't matter anymore. Doesn't matter, because now they are dead, and Sirius is the traitor, and Peter is who knows where.

" _You-know-who has been defeated." says Minister of Magic Millicent Bagnold, "He was killed by a one-year-old. This boy will be the most powerful wizard since Merlin, I'm sure."_

Defeated. After years of death and destruction, causing misery across the whole world, orphaned children and heartbroken families, destroying lives to the greatest extent … it can't be over. _That_ I can't process. My whole life has been affected by this murderer, and now he is gone, and…

 _Black went on to kill thirteen muggles in plain sight. He was reported to have laughed as aurors dragged him away. For this capture, we thank the late Peter Pettigrew, killed by Black, who left only his little finger, lying in a pool of blood. The Ministry have posthumously awarded Pettigrew with an Order of Merlin, first class, for this noble feat._

Suddenly I have no purpose. There is no need to spy for Dumbledore. There are no friends to comfort or to be comforted by. The Order will surely be disbanded. My mother is dead. My father will do better off without me. And I am a werewolf. I am dangerous. Too dangerous to live.

I have seen the destruction wreaked by my kind. Fenrir Greyback, leaning over a limp body. A pack chasing innocents into burning houses. The barking laughter of wild beasts as they hunted their prey. Menacing shadows leaping through the night.

I don't want others to feel my pain, and now there is no reason for my existence at all. I can only hope to live in poverty for the rest of my life.

I can still hear Sirius' laughter in my ears. I had always thought it was a good laugh: strong and hearty and dog-like, but now, after reading the newspaper entry, I can only imagine him laughing cruelly as he stands in Peter's blood.

It echoes around my head and only then do I realise that it is raining. Raindrops drip down my face, and they are shockingly cold. They wake me from my reverie, and I wipe them away, pulling up the hood of my cloak.

Who is here to stay for? I ask myself as I wander down the street.

James, who is dead.

Lily, who is dead.

Peter, who is dead.

Mum, who is dead.

Dorcas, who is dead and hated me however much I loved her.

Dad, who shouldn't have to deal with me.

Dumbledore, who doesn't need me anymore.

Harry, who should never have to grow up with a werewolf.

Sirius, who might as well be dead, too - a traitor and a murderer.

All gone. All my options have blown away from me, leaving me alone in the cold streets of Diagon Alley.

The Marauders had accepted me. They gave me a reason to live, and now they aren't here for me. Aren't there for a laugh or a drink or a talk or to help me with my 'furry little problem'.

It's as if someone has hollowed out my heart. I cannot even cry.

Somehow that fact makes it worse. As if I don't care. As if I didn't even know those people. As if my whole world hadn't been killed by one newspaper article.

The rain is still pattering onto my face, and I let it. Maybe I deserve to be cold and wet and poor if I'm so heartless that I can't even manage some tears for the deaths of the only people that matter.

Dead.

My whole life, I've lived behind a sheet of glass. People can see me, but they can't really know me, know my suffering. I had friends who smashed that glass, who I could relax around and talk to, and they _knew_ me. Not Remus Lupin the sickly schoolboy. They knew Remus Lupin, werewolf. And they didn't care. They didn't pull away, or cry, or yell, or throw stones at me, or insult me, or what other have done.

Now the glass has frosted over, and I am separate from the world once more.

The cosy warmth of friendship had soon elevated into the burning flames of family. And now … all I feel is the bleak, desolate chill of loneliness. I know I can only continue on the road to complete despair. No money, no friends, no house.

What will happen to me? It's not as if anyone cares.

Nowhere to lock myself up when I transform. I'll bite people, and I'll go mad. I'll be like Fenrir Greyback, developing a thirst for human blood and turning mad because of it. I'll be hated even more, and I'll be hunted and I'll be caught, and end up living in the cell next to Sirius in Azkaban.

 _That_ I could never deal with.

Next comes the rage. I've been expecting it. It's all because of Sirius. My world will slowly burn before my eyes, and it will be all his fault. His fault I no longer have living friends. His fault I can't continue to live in either his flat of James' house. His fault that madness is now not a possibility, but an inevitability for me. His fault I'm stuck behind a pane of frosted glass.

I will live, though. For Harry. I hope to see him, to help him. Some day.

I am the last Marauder, and whatever the inevitability, I will live the last years of my sorrowful story in the memory of the lost camaraderie between us. Even if I must live it behind a sheet of frosted glass.


End file.
